Matthew Wright has opened up about a stalking ordeal that left him and his wife Amelia traumatised.
The couple appeared on Monday’s edition of Lorraine Kelly’s ITV show to discuss their experience, which Amelia described as the “most horrendous time we’ve been through”.
During the interview, the former Wright Stuff host explained that the stalking “built up over a period of time”, beginning with a fan who repeatedly showed up to the audience of his old Channel 5 panel show.
“I was friendly to everybody in the audience, but I was unaware that she started to develop notions that we had a relationship,” he explained.
“Then a newspaper ran an interview with her and that was the first time and she said something like, ‘I don’t like the way our relationship is going’ and I thought, ‘I’ve never had a relationship with you!’.”
Following this, the woman was banned from his show, but began turning up at public events where Matthew and Amelia were in attendance.
Amelia recalled one incident when the woman approached her at a charity event while she was heavily pregnant, saying: “This very done up and glamorous woman approached me and said ‘I have to speak to Matthew, I don’t like the way our relationship ended’.
“Then she came out with… ‘women your age are more likely to have a stillbirth’. I was just shocked to the core.”
After leaving the event abruptly, the woman in question then began turning up at the couple’s home, even threatening Amelia and her baby.
“I was on my own and she was shouting through the letterbox, ‘I’m going to find the maternity ward where you are and I’m going to wait outside for you and the baby’, ” Amelia revealed.
Matthew continued: “We had to get police involved and have a word with her and that didn’t seem to do any good.
“The final visit when I was in the house with her, she was saying things like ‘I want to hold the baby, I want the baby’.”
Amelia said: “Just after Cassady had been born, she turned up on the doorstep. I was on my own the first time. She was trying to push her hand through the letterbox saying, ‘I want the baby, I want the baby. Give me the baby.’ Can you imagine what that would do to a new mum?”
Matthew then added: “Amelia wouldn’t go out of the house and when we did go out of the house together, she would be looking down every side street in every doorway expecting someone to leap out.
“As anyone who has been through this kind of experience will tell you, it just takes over your life.”
The TV presenter praised the police for the way they handled the situation, although Amelia admitted that she is still “shaken” by the ordeal.
“You can imagine how you just live in fear and terror and you don’t want to go out,” she said. “[It should have been] a joyous time [following the birth of her daughter], absolutely.
“The last time she came round Matthew was there but she got more hysterical and it got more serious. Where she said, ‘I want the baby, I want to take care of the baby. Give me the baby’. That’s when it got to a different level.
“It’s cast a long shadow over me, I am still shaken by the whole thing and feel upset. Obviously, I hope help is given but it’s left me emotionally scarred.”
Matthew added: “I think Amelia has had a much harder time reconciling it than I have. Being subjected to it while you are alone in the house when you are heavily pregnant or with a little baby is a very different experience.
“That being said, women harassing men is still a problem and we shouldn’t treat it lightly… these things are not a joke.”
Matthew stepped down as host of The Wright Stuff after 18 years in 2018, with the presenter and Amelia welcoming Cassady in January 2019.
The couple have spoken openly about their struggles to conceive, which Amelia pointed out had made Matthew’s stalker’s comments about her fertility all the more hurtful.
Lorraine airs every weekday from 9am on ITV.
Useful websites and helplines
Mind, open Monday to Friday, 9am-6pm on 0300 123 3393.
Samaritans offers a listening service which is open 24 hours a day, on 116 123 (UK and ROI – this number is FREE to call and will not appear on your phone bill).
CALM (the Campaign Against Living Miserably) offer a helpline open 5pm-midnight, 365 days a year, on 0800 58 58 58, and a webchat service.
The Mix is a free support service for people under 25. Call 0808 808 4994 or email help@themix.org.uk
Rethink Mental Illness offers practical help through its advice line which can be reached on 0300 5000 927 (Monday to Friday 10am-4pm). More info can be found on rethink.org.